Let me make it clear in the beginning, that title is not mine. It is the title of one of William Shakespeare’s sonnets from Love’s Labor’s Lost. I will explain below why I chose this title.

During last week of December, 2018 we visited Zion National Park. There, on our hike on Temple of Sinawava Trail and the trail to the Emerald Pools, we saw icicles hanging by the walls of the majestic cliffs. This brought back memories from my highschool days , and believe me that was a long long time ago,where our poetry textbook had the poem with the title above as a required reading.Continue reading “Thursday Tidbits: When Icicles Hang by the Wall”

Out in vacation till the end of the year. I had high hopes of writing a travel diary and sharing with my blogily. But the travel gods had other plans. They wanted to spare a few readers I had the misery of going through the dreadful prose I write. So here enters technology. Slow internet speed makes it a struggle to download and attach photos with my post and upload it to WordPress in the little time that I have for myself during the vacation duties. It becomes quite frustrating at times. So my dear readers, I will try to post when I can.

Happy Holidays to you all. Have a wonderful Xmas with your family and a great 2019.

Before I let you go will like to share a little tidbit about our travel yesterday. For our travel we had booked a Dodge Durango. Unfortunately when we went to pick up the car what we got was a Infinity QX 60 with only 39 miles on the odometer which was great. What was not great that the cargo space in the Infinity was much smaller compared to the Durango. We had to repack all our luggage resulting in a late night the day before the trip. That escalated to a late morning start and encountering heavy holiday traffic and a trip that was supposed to be about nine hours drive ended up being a fourteen hour drive. In the very beginning of the trip, a portion of the highway that would normally be a forty minute drive ended up being a two and quarter hours drive forcing us to stop at the first available rest camp to answer nature’s call speeded up by cups of early morning coffe. It was restful to say the least and scenery was terrific.

San Luis Reservoir, Dec 22, 2018

Around 5 PM we stopped near the intersection of Highway 99 and Highway 58, still about four hours drive from Las Vegas as per map. After feeing up gas and some coffee and drinks for ourselves we started with high hopes of arriving Vegas by about 9 PM, still decent time. But horrendous traffic both at highway 58 and Interstate 15 kept on pushing back the arrival time. After about three hours of driving and Vegas still about three hours ahead it became apparent that we will need to stop somewhere. By that time the river of red lights from 5mph cars in front of us was becoming quite monotonous. Only saving grace was the beautiful full moon over the Mojave desert. But that also became an issue as it became quite apparent that relieving oneself by the road size will result in good exposure. Few brave souls however had done just that braving the bright full moon. By the time we got to the first rest camp on I 15, parking lots were nearly full. The line from the rest rooms (not sure why it is called rest room though ) were snaking out to the parking lot. One young guy in front of me in the line was shivering like crazy, dancing an odd dance move stanging on one leg and then the other. The poor soul was trying to control coming out on the open. A few good hearted people advised him to go find the nearest dark corner but he ignored. Actually he had number two coming. Thank God that he did not go out in the line but it was a terrible sight to behold.

Without much further ado and no more near calamities, we arrived Vegas by about 11:30 PM and got to our rooms past midnight. To hell with sight seeing plans for Sunday, it was off to bed we go (of course after a little late night sojourn, what would be a trip to Vegas without that).

This post is in response to Frank’s Tuesday Photo Challenge prompt Memories. Memories are of many things, travel, birth, death, graduation,wedding etc., etc., etc. Capturing two of them here, one from our travel to Crater Lake, Oregon in July of 2002 and the other from my eldest son’s high school graduation in 2004.

I seen the world
Through
Stranger’s eyes
Eyes that I have not seen
Never met
But they have become my friendly guides
Lands and oceans, mountains and valleys
I have travelled through their eyes
Ever thankful that from the comfort of my home
I have travelled far and wide
Thank you my friends
Let the words flow
Even if we never meet
Know that the bond is strong
Your words speak to me
In a way that my eyes
Will never be able to see
Before the inevitable happens
And my words stop
Let me say loud and clear
Thankful ever
To meet you all
Your words enlighten me
An education that is free
Knowledge I shall cherish
Strangers you are, true
But I shall never have
Friends better than thee

Last few days I had to wait for many hours to get a call or text from my better half. She has been travelling with family in North India visiting the states of Jammu and Kashmir (J&K), Punjab and Himachal Pradesh (HP). Every day she had spent lots of hours on the road, travelling from one place to another. With a twelve and half hours time difference between USA and India and the fact that she being on the road it was difficult to get a good phone connection, I had to wait for her to call me or text me to let me know where she was. Yesterday ( or rather today morning Indian time) she had reached the hotel at 2:30 AM travelling 250 KM on hilly roads from one hill station to another. Waiting is difficult.

This made me think about wait and waiting and its many forms. When I was in college doing my engineering degree, there was no cell phone. There was no good telephone connection even. To get news from home, sometimes I had to wait for couple of weeks to get a letter from home. When I followed my sweetheart to USA for my graduate studies, I had no way to contact her before I left India to let her know when I was arriving. She had to wait for my call from JFK on my arrival to let her know that I was in USA. Unfortunately she was in class that time so I had to relay the message to her through circuitous way. I had to wait till I met her at the airport to know if she had got my message or not. I do not even want to mention about the tyranny of Ma Bell, waiting till the wee hours past mid night to get a cheaper rate to call India from USA. In today’s technology driven world of instant messaging, those type of wait may be history. However, wait and waiting have many forms and all of us, sometime or other, have experienced wait and waiting in some form or other. Many of us, for whatever reason, are waiting for the results of the coming November 8 presidential elections. Everyday lots of people wait for the results of their job interviews. Many wait for the results of their medical tests. For those who got good news, their wait is over. For others, it is back to square one.

Last but not the least, if I do not mention about my wait for my $1 weekly investment to bear fruit, this story will be incomplete. I am sure one day lady luck will smile on me and my wait will be over. I will be a multi millionaire. Will definitely win the lottery. Just wait.

Slowly and steadily I am coming towards the end of my journey with the letter W. I am waiting anxiously for the next thirteen weeks to be over. Thirteen more words starting with W and thirteen more poems, then I am done with this journey. But today I wait. I wait to finish my poem starting with “Wait and Waiting” for week thirty seven of my fifty two weeks journey with the letter W.